


do what you brought me out here for

by a_chilleus



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Merlin Waiting for Arthur Pendragon's Return (Merlin), References to Drugs, both are in the past though, uh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-08
Updated: 2020-07-08
Packaged: 2021-03-04 20:34:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25152484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_chilleus/pseuds/a_chilleus
Summary: For a time, there had been a sick sense of excitement when he watched people fuck things up, hurt each other, destroy their communities and ruin the country for their own children — each new disaster, he had thought, made the world more and more in need of a saviour. Now, though, he was just tired.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8





	do what you brought me out here for

**Author's Note:**

> or: because the Mountain Goats makes me feel things  
> title from 'Family Happiness' by the Mountain Goats, and also inspiration from 'Heel Turn 2', also by the Mountain Goats.

The car stuttered to a halt at the edge of the forest. If you didn't know where to look you would miss the crumbling slabs of stone half-buried under the moss beside the road, but Merlin had been there when the now-eroded markers were erected — not that he needed them to find the place. It had looked very different back then, of course. Men had cut down the original forest, and a few generations later their descendents replanted it, and  _ their  _ descendants cut that one down. The trees that stood here now were probably only five or so generations old, though Merlin wasn't keeping track. He hadn't thought to be sentimental about the forest when it was first cut down; he didn’t especially want a reminder of the events that had transpired there, and anyway, after over a thousand years he had accepted that his own memory was more durable than anything material.

Except, perhaps, stone. He got out of the rusty old car and kicked halfheartedly at the moss. He allowed the corner of his mouth to lift almost imperceptibly at the memory of himself and the son of the local mason carving careful block letters into the stone, an indication to travellers that Camelot was ten miles to the north. It was a memorable day simply for its novelty, in that it was one of few genuinely cheerful days after Camlann. He had told the mason's son about his early days in Camelot; it was the first time in a year that he had said Arthur's name aloud without his smile faltering or his voice cracking.

"I hated that prat at first," Merlin had laughed, then laughed even harder at the shocked expression on the boy's face. "Don't worry, Gwen — uh, Queen Guinivere — would agree with me," he said. "She hated him just as much, until she got to know him properly. He had to really work hard to prove he wasn't just an arrogant arse."

Once the boy had got over his incredulity at hearing the revered dead king called a prat, he had requested story after story from Merlin, who surprised himself with his willingness to oblige.

He had told those stories to generations of children in Camelot, until eventually he tired of telling them, and the local children had more recent tales to entertain them. Arthur was a distant cultural memory, and Merlin almost preferred it that way; the truth was his to know alone, now, something private, separate from the stories revived in such strange shape by writers centuries later.

He grabbed his bag from his car and slammed the door shut with an aggression that almost startled him. The tremor in his hands betrayed his nervous hope, as well as the large amount of coffee on which he was relying to remain awake. Despite his better judgement, he had driven all the way here from his city flat, to the place in which his dream had taken place. It wasn't the first time, and it likely wouldn't be the last; his reason told him this was a useless endeavour, but he had to know for certain. As he got further from the road the sound of cars receded and Merlin felt both more at home than he had in years and a sense of deep unfamiliarity. This was the forest in which Arthur had died, and it wasn't; the marker-stones were there, or what remained of them, but these were different trees, different soil even, and Merlin had the strange sense that he wasn't welcome here. Even the birds seemed to quieten whenever he grew near, and the air tasted metallic in a way that he knew no one but him would perceive, but he ignored it. They had no right to tell him where he could and couldn't go. He put his headphones in, but after skipping every single song that came up he pulled them off in frustration and shoved them back in his bag.

He reached the place with little effort. The trees may be new, the paths may be different, but stone lasts. It didn't look special, just a large boulder half-submerged in a bog, but Merlin knew instantly. It didn't look as it had in his dream, but he reasoned that dreams were figurative, not literal, and prophetic dreams especially were tricky things. Besides, it wasn't like the rock would have the sword still sticking out of it — that was rusting at the bottom of the Lake. Still... he knew he should prepare himself for the worst. On one hand, this dream felt so significant, he felt so sure that this was the One, it was Time — but on the other hand, that's exactly how he had felt back in the 80s, and the 1810s, and the 1750s... last time, he had gone to France on a mad chase, booking the plane ticket just hours after waking up from the dream, still scribbling notes on his arms as he waited to board, only to arrive at what he felt sure was the spot and look around and realise that no, Arthur had not returned, and was not going to return any time soon.

"Albion's greatest need," Merlin muttered, wading through the mud to sit on top of the stone. Every decade in the last two centuries he had looked at the world changing around him and thought  _ surely, surely this is the worst things can get, _ and with each new disaster he found it harder and harder to sympathise with these people. Why  _ would _ Arthur return, if 'Albion's greatest need' was brought on by the people themselves? He knew, somewhere in the back of his mind, that he was being unfair — but he didn't want to listen to his better self. His better self hadn't kept Arthur alive, and it wouldn't bring him back.

For a time, there had been a sick sense of excitement when he watched people fuck things up, hurt each other, destroy their communities and ruin the country for their own children — each new disaster, he had thought, made the world more and more in need of a saviour. Now, though, he was just tired. He didn't remember ever being this tired back then. He had yawned and ached and complained after raids and battles, he had been travel-sore and weary, but he'd never been tired like this. This was like someone had poured molten lead into his joints and then let it set and harden before the burns could heal — it hurt to drag himself out of bed, and it hurt to lie back down. He had let his body grow young again, reversing the aging charms that had eased the pain of seeing his own face in the mirror, but it made no difference.

“Arthur?” He called out awkwardly. Seemingly in response, a bird squawked from behind him, and Merlin’s heart skipped a beat. He forced himself to calm his breathing, and looked around slowly. If he only knew what kind of bird that was, maybe it would give some sign as to Arthur’s whereabouts, or maybe the bird was a messenger, or maybe Arthur’s soul had been reincarnated in the body of a bird  _ —  _ he could cope with that, he thought, if it was the only way Arthur could return. 

"You ok there mate?"

Merlin flinched, turning to glare at the interruption. He knew how he must look to the stranger: old dirty clothes, mud up to his knees, a face that betrayed how little he slept and how rarely he bothered to eat. He tugged his brown hoodie tighter around him protectively, feeling the frayed edges beneath his fingers. He knew he should buy a new one, but the company that made them had changed their manufacturing process over a decade ago and he was unlikely to be able to find one exactly the same. It had felt like a miracle when he found this one — the fabric so uncannily similar to the one he used to wear that he almost let himself believe it was a sign. It was just a coincidence, of course. In over a thousand years there was no reason a clothing designer wouldn't stumble across a fabric that happened to feel similar to something he used to wear. It had been a comfort, though, for all of these years since, and he hardly took it off.

"Mate, seriously, are you alright?"

"Fuck off."

"Alright, jeez." The stranger — a tall, bearded man wearing flannel and a green gilet — raised his hands and took a step backwards, but didn't look away from Merlin. "Just — if you're taking something, I don't want to leave you here. It's getting late."

Merlin rolled his eyes, but the man's words made his look around properly: it  _ was _ getting dark, and he wondered how long he had been lost in thought sitting on the stone.

"I'm not on drugs," he said. He wanted the man to leave, and he considered  _ making _ him leave.

"Not yet, maybe, but I've seen young men like you around before."

Merlin laughed —  _ young men  _ — and then winced at the look on the man's face.

"I have no intention of taking anything," he said, firmly. "And no, I'm not crazy either." He didn't know why he hadn't got rid of him yet. It would be easy.

"Well, ok. But let me give you my number. If you need help, call me."

"Uh. Sure."

Merlin handed over his phone and let the man add himself to the contacts list. His name, it turned out, was Liam.

"Sorry if I seem pushy mate," Liam said. "It's just — you remind me of my little brother." Merlin bit back a sigh. "I don't want to see you go the same way he did."

Once Liam had left, Merlin let himself roll his eyes hard.  _ Mawkish idiot _ . As if he cared about some reckless teenager.  _ You would have mourned even a stranger’s loss, back then. You would have  _ — It wouldn’t have done any good then, and it won’t do any good now. As if it wasn’t a mercy to die so young, instead of living through all of this. As if he hadn't already tried what Liam's brother had apparently managed, and every other way besides.

And then he realised why he hadn't forced Liam to leave. The first attempt, just days after Camlann, it had been Leon who found him.

"You ok there, Merlin?" Leon evidently hadn't been sleeping either, finding Merlin on the top of the castle, eyes widening with the realisation. Same tone as well, that cautious concern that Merlin had appreciated, back then, but which now only made him feel small.

So Merlin was the sentimental idiot. He thought he had got over this in the 1600s, this seeing-his-dead-friends'-faces-in-people thing. Pathetic.

It was properly dark, now, nearing midnight. Merlin pulled out his notebook and switched his phone to torch mode, muttering something to stop the battery draining.  _ Fifteen hundred years haven't improved my handwriting. _ Then again, the diagonal scrawl had been written early that morning, as Merlin frantically tried to recall every detail of his dream.  _ Swrd stone,  _ _ horns  _ _ antlers / Arthur climte chang mayb fire / EXCALIBUR —  _ it didn't make any sense, but he knew he was supposed to be here. Or... he was probably supposed to be here. It felt right, but since when could he trust his feelings? It was easy to fool himself. He had every other time.

He thought of Liam's brother. Poor kid. Merlin hoped vaguely that the kid had at least got the high he'd been looking for before he died. The drugs didn't work on him anymore. He had no idea if it was related to his magic. He had experimented during certain decades that were even more tedious than the rest of his dull life, but had managed nothing that he couldn’t sleep off within five years. He had learnt thousands of spells and several languages, and was a master at chess, Poker, and every Skyrim game. Nothing was enough to ease the boredom, anymore; nothing distracted him from the ache, from the loneliness, from the cold. 

A rustling maybe three feet away caught his attention. Merlin sat very still, slowing his breathing until it was barely audible. He bit his lip as he saw antlers poke above a holly bush. A fallow deer. The animal finally emerged; seemingly unaware of Merlin’s presence, it moved slowly closer to the clearing, stopping to graze or to listen to sounds Merlin couldn’t hear. He held his breath.

In his dream, Merlin had been wearing the antlers. 

It had to be a sign. He didn’t dare move. 

A raindrop hit his left shoulder. He watched the deer as it gently flattened the damp earth with its hoof, closely followed its line of sight, counted each of the white patches on its flank, catalogued in his mind every detail he could in case something  _ —  _ anything  _ —  _ was a clue to what he had been brought out here to do. 

The rain began to come down in earnest. The deer paused for a second, stock still, then a loud  _ caw  _ sounded in a tree half a metre away and it disappeared back into the trees. Merlin blinked the rain out of his eyes, but didn’t move from where he sat. His hoodie was soaked through in minutes, but he hardly noticed.  _ This can’t be it.  _ He pulled his phone from his pocket; if he were anyone else it wouldn’t have turned on, it was so wet, but Merlin didn’t have to do anything to make it obey him without question. His notes app was still open but, no matter how many times he reread those words, his early morning typos were of no help. He closed it angrily, instead opening the BBC news app, scrolled through a few pages of celebrity gossip and mundane party politics  _ — nothing remotely significant happening today, anywhere in the world? Seriously?  _ He couldn’t have been mistaken, then; the dream must have been for him, not some premonition about happenings elsewhere in the world… He leapt off the stone and knelt down beside it, mud seeping into his battered trainers and spattering on his jeans. He pressed his palm to the stone, closed his eyes, breathed as slowly as he could. Nothing. He gently brushed his fingertips across the rough surface, feeling for anything unusual, anything new, anything at all. Feeling nothing, he pressed his cheek to it, then his forehead, whispering every spell he knew  _ — open, reveal yourself, show me your secrets, tell me...  _

By the time he stood up, grimacing at the pain in his knees and his lower back, the sky was lightening, but the rain hadn’t stopped. 

“Arthur?” His voice was hoarse. 

He felt stupid. The stone was unchanged. The forest was silent. 

“Arthur, please.”

Maybe it was all a trick. Maybe he had been brought out here for no reason at all.

“Arthur? G-Gwen?”

Unless....

“ _ Aos sí _ ? Is this your doing? Did you bring me out here?” 

_ As if I’d ever get a straight answer out of them.  _

__ “Someone? God?! Anyone?” He choked on his tears, and wiped his face furiously with his sleeve. “SOMEONE FUCKING ANSWER ME!” He was screaming at the sky, cheeks burning with cold and wet hair sticking to his forehead. “DID YOU BRING ME OUT HERE JUST TO LAUGH AT ME? IS THIS A FUCKING JOKE? AM I A FUCKING JOKE?”

He got no response. 

**Author's Note:**

> I used “aos sí” for what the show calls “sidhe” - ie the fairy-like creatures - because when I googled to check the spelling, I found this on Wikipedia article: “Sídhe are the hills or tumuli that dot the Irish landscape. [...] In a number of later, English-language texts, the word sídhe is incorrectly used both for the mounds and the people of the mounds.” If I remember correctly, the show subtitles and wiki call the aos sí “sídhe” so really I should probably use that since it’s canon, but it’s my fic and I’d prefer to be accurate(ish) to the mythology, so there :P That said, I know very little Irish, and what I do know is confusing as hell, so for all I know there’s a vocative case or something and I’m still wrong in how I’ve used it.


End file.
